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Hi, everybody.

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Welcome to module one.

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This module sets the tone
and the basis, the foundation

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for the rest of this semester.

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So it's important to be well grounded

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in the basics of the US legal system.

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Some of you probably already
know this, others do not.

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So this is just where we're gonna start

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to make sure we are all on the same page.

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In high school, in many high schools,

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you had civics lessons

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where we talked about what are
the branches of government,

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what is political science,

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how do we deal with public affairs

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and the duties of citizens?

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Many hated it, some loved it.

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You can guess how I felt about it.

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Much of this course

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is going to revolve around
the legal system, legal cases,

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and as I talked about in the introduction,

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these are real life situations.

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They're hard situations.

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They evolve, they devolve into litigation,

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and it results in judicial
decisions or pronouncements

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that we tend to call opinions.

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So a lot of times in this course,

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you're going to read a judicial opinion.

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These cases are a reflection

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of something that happened
previously, sometimes years ago,

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because as those cases work
their way up through appeals,

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it takes quite a long time.

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Another thing to keep in mind
is we're looking at the facts

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as these higher courts
decided more important facts.

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So a lot of times, you might think,

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"Is there more to this story,

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or are we hearing the whole story,

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or is part of the story missing?"

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Yes, could very well be, because
as judges wrote decisions,

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they might have kept certain facts

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that they found important to the situation

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and discarded facts

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they did not think was
important to the decision.

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To discuss the cases
and opinions presented,

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you really have to understand

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where the case stands in the hierarchy.

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So in the legal system,
we have this hierarchy,

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as you probably know.

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We have kind of these local
district level courts,

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and that can be both a
state or a federal model.

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Then you have these kind
of appellate courts,

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that first level that oversees
the original decisions,

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and then we have kind of that third level,

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which is like the Supreme
Court of the United States,

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or in various states, it
could be the Supreme Court

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or the Law Court or the
Court of Final Appeals.

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They can be all called different things.

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So basically think of the courts

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as having these three levels.

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That's an oversimplification,

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but that'll kind of help you
figure out where this case is.

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You may also consider the
questions in the module.

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These are things to think
about as you read a case.

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If you haven't read a case before,

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just think about who are the parties here?

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Just stop and think about,
wait, who are the parties here?

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Often list the parties and the titles,

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but that can be confusing.

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Sometimes it has multiple parties.

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Sometimes it has an anonymous party.

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If it's anonymous, why do you
think it could be anonymous?

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So who brought that action?

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Where's the court?

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You know, it can be a
state or federal court,

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and so sometimes you
just have to figure out

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what region it is.

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Are you at the trial court decision level,

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or are you much higher?

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So we call that the appellate
history, where the case is.

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You know, facts we talked about.

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Are there facts that you
would like to know about

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that you're not seeing?

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Do you feel like something
is totally missing?

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Do you feel like certain facts were pulled

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to make the decision in a certain way?

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Issues, like what are the
precise issues being litigated?

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One of the hardest things I think

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about understanding legal opinions

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is they're really crafted
very, very narrowly

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to answer a precise question.

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So sometimes you just read those facts

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and you think this is
about this whole situation,

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but judges often narrow it down

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to a single or a few principles,

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so that those principles
can apply to future cases.

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There's a principle that you understand,

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like, what do we take away from this?

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And likewise, just with the facts,

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do you agree with the way the
court has framed that issue?

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How do they frame that issue

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that they're going to decide on?

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Do you agree with really
that's what's going on here?

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And then what was the decision, you know?

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We often agree or disagree
with these decisions.

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We all know, can think of decisions

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that we thought were
just very way off base

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in how they were decided.

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What's the rationale there?

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And then as the course moves on,

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we're gonna continue to
think about implications.

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So what does that mean, and
how does that affect us?

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An easy example is the
Affordable Care Act, right?

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The Affordable Care Act in 2011,

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multiple attempts to have
courts rule it unconstitutional.

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Well, what's the implication of that,

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is that they would have basically said

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the law is undone, unenforceable.

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That's not always the case.

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Judges don't always say,

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"Yes, we're either calling this whole law

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enforceable or not."

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There's a lot of
different nuances to that.

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So you might wanna just
think about the implications.

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Often in healthcare,

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implications can be nuanced, wide ranging.

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And as we think about healthcare
administration, you know,

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how do healthcare administrators
prepare to deal with this?

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Often healthcare administrators,

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whether or not they were lawyers,

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do have to have an
understanding of the law,

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how it impacts healthcare and their work.

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So this week, we're gonna
talk about just some basics.

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What are the basics,
foundations of our system?

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How does courts impact law?

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What do judicial decisions do?

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How is that tied to healthcare?

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And where does that leave us?

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And that'll just get us into module two,

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where we can start talking

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a little bit about the
history of healthcare

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and where we're at now.

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So make sure to check out the class notes.

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The slides will be explained
a little bit more next week,

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and I'll see you in the
Yellowdig discussion forum.